NASHVILLE – Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery and fellow Republican attorneys general in Kentucky and Ohio sued the Biden administration Thursday over its Sept. 9 vaccine mandate for federal workers and federal contractors.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky in Frankfort, came in response to President Joe Biden’s issuance of executive orders in September requiring all executive branch employees and federal contractors to be vaccinated by Dec. 8 with “minimal exceptions.”
The lawsuit is not aimed at the administration’s just-released rule on COVID-19 vaccine-or-testing mandates for workers at companies having more than 100 employees, although Slatery is widely expected to file suit later challenging that requirement as well.
Slatery’s fellow Republicans in the General Assembly last week passed a series of bills pushing back on COVID-19 vaccine mandates and mask requirements. Republican Gov. Bill Lee has yet to act on the measures. There was also a resolution passed urging Slatery to sue over the new administration rule for employers.
In their 50-page complaint filed over vaccine mandates for executive branch workers and government contractors, Slatery, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost charge the Biden administration’s mandatory requirement is “unlawful and unconstitutional.”